Knesset Debates the Dramatic Bill to Remove the Police Internal Investigations Unit from the State Prosecutor’s Office

Police Internal Investigations Department | Photo: Chaim Goldberg, Flash90 The dramatic bill to remove the Police Internal Investigations Department from the prosecutor’s office is being debated in the Knesset. Matti Tuchfeld, an hour ago 8 36 1 After the law is approved, the Police Internal Investigations Department will become an independent body, no longer subordinate to the prosecutor’s office • The bill was initiated by former senior department official MK Moshe Saada • It is one of the most significant laws in the judicial reform

The Knesset plenum is now debating one of the most dramatic bills among the judicial reform laws, the removal of the Police Internal Investigations Department from the prosecutor’s office. The bill was initiated by MK Moshe Saada, and it stipulates that the Police Internal Investigations Department will be removed for the first time from the hands of the State Prosecutor’s Office and from the control of the Attorney General and the State Attorney, and will operate as an independent and autonomous body.

2 + MK Moshe Saada | Photo: Yonatan Sindel, Flash 90

The department’s independence, which will come into force once the law is approved, as a separate organization not subject to the prosecutor’s office, is especially critical in light of a number of scandals in which the organization was allegedly involved, and which in the eyes of many became over the years a kind of "private militia" of the Attorney General and an investigative body against police officers and citizens that is completely subordinate to her authority. Among other things, the Police Internal Investigations Department was mentioned as having been involved in controversial investigations of Avishai Moualem, Lahav 433 commander Manny Ben Hamin, and Kobi Yaakobi, head of the Israel Prison Service, all of whom were said to have in common their refusal to comply with the Attorney General’s dictates.

2 + Stop controlling the Police Internal Investigations Department | Photo: Yonatan Sindel, Flash 90

The law, as mentioned, was initiated by Saada, himself a former senior Police Internal Investigations Department official, and is based mainly on a State Comptroller report on the subject, which determined that the situation in which the department is part of the State Attorney’s Office without structural separation between them constitutes an institutional conflict of interest. In the report, the comptroller stated that "the subordination of the Police Internal Investigations Department to the State Attorney’s Office, alongside the close and daily cooperation between the prosecutor’s office and the police in ordinary criminal cases, may create a structural conflict of interest." According to him, this organizational affiliation "casts a shadow over its independence." The comptroller further determined that, in his recommendation, a professional team should be established "to reexamine the organizational and functional aspects of the Police Internal Investigations Department." He emphasized that models should be examined that would ensure "full independence" for all bodies handling complaints against police officers, while reviewing global trends that lean toward external and completely independent review bodies.

2 + Israel Police | Photo: Shutterstock

The report revealed that although its role is to investigate the police, the Police Internal Investigations Department still depends on the police for tools, equipment, and certain operational support, such as escorting detainees or protecting investigators. The comptroller determined that this situation harms the department’s independence. After the report was published, the Minister of Justice appointed, as recommended in the report, a special team to examine the status of the Police Internal Investigations Department and tasked it with recommending to the government a series of structural changes that would ensure the organization’s independence. The team, headed by the director general of the Justice Ministry, recommended removing the Police Internal Investigations Department from the prosecutor’s office and reestablishing it as an independent body.

Saada’s bill stipulates that the Police Internal Investigations Department will be independent and that its head will be appointed by a professional team to be established by the director general of the Justice Ministry. The Attorney General and the State Attorney strongly opposed removing the Police Internal Investigations Department from the prosecutor’s office, meaning from their control, and on the day the bill was laid before the Knesset, about three years ago, State Prosecutor’s Office employees launched a general strike in protest against the bill.

The judicial reform, Police Internal Investigations Department, Moshe Saada 8 write a comment